This is what I found about it: > The bitcoin system is based around the "block chain", whose main purpose is to implement a distributed timestamp. With a known

This is what I found about it: > The bitcoin system is based around the "block chain", whose main purpose is to implement a distributed timestamp. With a known set of participants, this is a solved problem (Paxos algorithm); on the public Internet with undefined participant list, it's hard. http://www.baum.com.au/~jiri/ae/blog/01306143707 http://www.baum.com.au/~jiri/ae/blog/01306143707